eneral and Miss
Bellairs leave us you can take my wife about."

"I should think you might take her yourself," and he gently kicked
Deane. He was afraid of arousing the General's dormant suspicions.

It was late at night when they arrived in Paris, but the faithful Laing
was on the platform to meet them, and received them with a warm
greeting. While the luggage was being collected by Deane's man, they
stood and talked on the platform. Presently the General, struck by a
sudden thought, asked:

"I suppose nothing came for us at Cannes, oh, Laing? You said you'd
bring anything on, you know."

Laing interrupted a pretty speech which he was trying to direct into
Dora's inattentive ears.

"Beg pardon, General?"

"No letters for any of us before you left Cannes?"

"No, Gen--" he began, but suddenly stopped. His mouth remained open and
his glass fell from his eye.

The General, not waiting to hear more than the first word, had rushed
of to hail a cab and Deane was escorting his wife. Dora and Charlie
stood waiting for the unfinished speech.

The end came slowly and with a prodigious emphasis of despair.

"Oh, by Jove!"

"Well, Mr. Laing?" said Dora.

"The morning you left--just after--there were two telegrams."

"For me?" said each of his auditors.

"One for each of you, but

"Oh, give me mine."

"Hand over mine, old chap."

"I--I haven't got 'em."

"What?"

"I--I'm awfully sorry, I.----I forgot 'em."

"Oh, how tiresome of you, Mr. Laing!"

"Send 'em round first thing to-morrow, Laing."

"But--but I don't know where I put 'em. I know I laid 'em down. Then I
took 'em up. Then I put 'em--where the deuce did I put 'em? Here's a
go, Miss Bellairs! I say, I am an ass!"

No contradiction assailed him. His victims glared reproachfully at him.

"I must have left them at Cannes. I'll wire first thing in the morning,
Miss Bellairs; I'll get up as soon as ever the office is open. I say,
do forgive me."

"Well, Mr. Laing, I'll try, but----"

"Laing! Here! My wife wants you," shouted Sir Roger, and the criminal,
happy to escape, ran away, leaving Dora and Charlie alone.

"They must have been from _them_," murmured Dora.

"No doubt; and that fool Laing----"

"What has he done with them?"

"Lit his pipe with them, I expect."

"Oh, what shall we do?"

"I don't know."

"What--what do you think they said, Mr. Ellerton?"

"How can I tell? Perhaps that the marriage was off!"

"Oh!" escaped from Dora